Broke, tired and weary as he is, I’d just like to wish Mark all the best. He’s a lovely chap and has been a real friend to me, to this blog, and to the wide community of Walsall bloggers he nurtured and promoted, and Walsall itself. Walsall will never see a better champion. Tomorrow, without the YamYam, we will all be the poorer.

Somewhere down the road – when all the wrinkles have been ironed out of this new media thing – when all the anodyne, faceless overhyped hyperlocal crap has died – we’ll all be nostalgic for what Mark did, and just what he showed us. I’ll miss you, mate, your influence on this blog was big, but on me, personally, it was massive. I think you know that.

Take care, old chap. Stay in touch. Tonight, this thing I do obsessively became almost unbearably sad, old and pointless. I wish you well, that monster you created out of nothing but a handful of angry people and a remarkable vision tilted the online world of Walsall on it’s axis. It’ll never be the same again, and never be the same without you at it’s heart.

4 Responses to Somewhere, in the distance…

I had thought I should write on the mothballing of the Yamyam, but quite frankly, it’s not worth it when all the rest of Walsall’s bloggers have already done it so well. The only thing I have to disagree with is

Tonight, this thing I do obsessively became almost unbearably sad, old and pointless.

Because you’re wrong. One look at your stats and comments RSS will tell you you’re wrong :-).

While the local blogs will all sadly miss the Yamyam- it’s a great loss- we should take advantage of the fact that it brought many of us to each others attention, and build on that.